Mr. Obama signed the measure, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, during a festive and at times raucous ceremony in the East Room of the White House. He spoke to an audience of nearly 300, including more than 200 Democratic lawmakers who rode a yearlong legislative roller coaster that ended with House passage of the bill Sunday night. They interrupted him repeatedly with cheers, applause and standing ovations.

My posts that day:

The Morning After The Morning After: ” If, as seems likely, the job market does not improve or slightly worsens, the blame needs to be placed — as it correctly should be — squarely at the feet of a President and party whose priority has been a deceptive and destructive health care plan, not helping the private sector grow. Democrats can talk their way out of almost anything, particularly with the help of the mainstream media, except the job numbers.”

We Need “Blue Light” Mandates: “If the government can force people to purchase private health insurance under threat of penalty because such purchase is necessary for the health care insurance system to work, then why not have Congress decree weekly “Blue Light” mandates to further various legislative purposes. How about requiring people to replace the brakes on their cars, even if not yet worn out, to lower the risk of accidents? Or reversible ceiling fans to lower energy use? Or two shovels, one for themselves and one for a community shovel ready project (if they can find one)? Any other suggestions?”

Mandate that all US citizens must annually purchase one handgun, rifle, or shotgun.

While we’re at it, everyone should be required to purchase 2 packs of cigarettes a week. Smoking them, of course, will be illegal.

Under the legal reasoning of the supporters of the health care mandate, I believe the Guns & Tobacco Mandate would pass constitutional muster.

The right to keep and bear arms specifically is protected by the Second Amendment to the Constitution. Since firearms are manufactured using metals and other materials shipped in interstate commerce, and are shipped across state lines, the federal government has a legitimate interest in regulating such activities, consistent with the Second Amendment. The mandated purchase of firearms would help maintain a well-functioning national weapons manufacturing and sales market, and thereby would further a legitimate governmental purpose.

As to tobacco, the fertilizer used to grow the tobacco is shipped in interstate commerce, as are the leaves for processing and manufactured end product. The ban on smoking the product once purchased also would be constitutional, since smoking contributes to health care costs which are assumed or subsidized by the federal government. Since heavy taxes are levied on tobacco, including taxes used to fund health care services, the government has a legitimate purpose in maintaining a steady flow of purchases and making sure the cancer sticks were not smoked.

Although not stated in Malclave’s proposal, I believe it is implicit that in the event a citizen or alien lawfully present in the United States failed to make such purchases, there would be a tax imposed based upon how evil the person was, as expressed numerically by his or her adjusted gross income.

Hence, the Guns & Tobacco Mandate really is just a tax, so it’s all good.

Rags: “In the end, however, I am mindful of what killed off Prohibition; a massive civil disobedience campaign.”

There you go. Given that the fed gov is driven by politicians and politicians are driven by polls, and factoring in examples of fed impotency in the face of large numbers of lawbreakers (illegal aliens, for one), if the SCOTUS endorses Obamacare mandates, the next step is to mount a movement towards national civil disobedience – simply refuse to obey Obamacare dictates, and when fined, refuse to pay, and if they persist, refuse to pay any taxes. If enough people do so, they will back down because they cannot jail everybody, literally, and for political reasons. I think that if enough people made it clear they intended to practice this or some similar mass civil disobedience, they’d back down before we had to actually do it – just as soon as the polls told them it was time.

Ezzz-actly, Henry. Many Conservatives will be uncomfortable with this, as they tend to be very law-abiding people.

But that only requires them to consider this question: if your attachment to obeying the law is that strong, are you not just one law away from being literally a slave to government?

Philosophically, we can all see the answer is ‘yes’.

Henry David Thoreau gave us a new tool our Revolutionary forefathers (and mothers) did not have…civil disobedience. (And I do not mean that in any other sense than the purest one. Emphatically NOT the anarchy we see in OWS.) I believe Prof. Jacobson wrote about it not long ago.

We, the governed, have merely to withdraw our consent, which we have a perfect right to do in the proper circumstances.

@Henry Hawkins: That may have worked before we allowed the government to become a tyrannical monster. Just look at the Sackett case. The unelected bureaucrats in the EPA had given itself so much power that it would not even permit the Sackett’s judicial review of its administrative ruling. The Sackett’s had to fight for 4 years all the way to the Supreme Court just so they can now have a court hear why they believe the EPA erred in its ruling.

In the 2700 page Obamacare law, the Democrats turned the IRS into the enforcer. If you or your employer do not buy the insurance and you refuse to pay the penalty, the IRS will slap a tax lien on your assets, seize your bank account, or otherwise extract the tribute they demand you pay. You are not free. The government has a monopoly on coercion. Pay the tribute — or have your assets forcibly taken from you or lose your liberty.

We like tyranny and hate liberty. That’s why we keep electing representatives to do this to us.

It is not free or without consequence, as one would expect. Fighting for your liberty (and not just attending a TEA Party rally) never really is. There seems to be an economy in the universe that governs such things.

The fact that some judges have found Obamacare constitutional undermines my confidence that the Supremes will reach what, to me, is an obvious conclusion. If the Congress can mandate that we buy health insurance, then there is no real limit on Congress’ power. That seems exactly the opposite of the Constitution’s purpose.

The courts seem to get all wrapped up in legal technicalities and lose sight of the bottom line. To me, the courts have already given the Congress way more power than the Constitution intended, mainly under the commerce clause. Why would they suddenly read and apply the actual words in the Constitution? They haven’t done so for 75 years or so.

Basically, they are setting it up for the SC, many of them giving good reasons to strike it down while not doing it themselves. Even the conservative judge from Cincinnati who upheld it brought up that old precedent about the farmer not being allowed to grow food for himself. Seemingly, to prod the court to revisit that awful precedent and possibly moving us back to much more Constitutional government.

And a whole host of variations thereof; but, for me that is getting too far in the weeds. You get stuck arguing seemingly conflicting case law, and end up with a narrow ruling that resolves nothing–but to add more case law–for future litigation.

No, I prefer the Government without Limits approach to the repeal argument.

It is not so much the mandate of the product (healthcare), but the regulation of the product.

Is not your health your “state of being”?

Is not your health much more than just physical? But also psychological, spiritual, environmental, etc., which can and does affect one’s physical health?

And they want to argue that a political appointee has the Constitutional power to regulate all that?

I agree completely with BrownDog and the philosophy contained therein.

But I fear Justice Kennedy does not, and so we’ll need the approach outlined by Ragspierre.

It really will be time for civil disobedience if ObamaCare gets past the USSC. BrownDog frames it as, “And they want to argue that a political appointee has the Constitutional power to regulate all that?”

Yes. And if ObamaCare is ‘constitutional’, that will all come to pass.

I have hit this point before and do so again. It’s about power.

Not just the over-arching power of the powerful to decide how all of us shall live and make that decision on our behalf, without our consent.

But also about the petty power of the bureaucracy. Obama or Pelosi or Sibelius can make grand decisions, but it’s the sub-assistant to the associate regional administrator who carries them out. We are empowering the apparatchiks to rule us and they shall not fail to pick up the cudgel.

We shall have a nation of Nosy Parkers decide what and how we shall eat, sleep and exercise. We shall have a nation of non-medical administrators telling doctors what to prescribe and pharmacists what to dispense. We shall have rent-seekers lobbying to do things in ways that benefit them, not us. We shall have glad-handers sucking up to administrators so as to cut in front of us in line. We shall have the pinky-ring wearers looking for and finding all the angles.

And we shall have government employees dispensing the favors and the waivers.

If you’ve seen the movie ‘Brazil’, you know how this will play out. “Damn, they’ve gone metric again!”

This will be run by people who will use force to break peaceful civil disobedience. Remember, this is the Progressive Left that will have been permanently empowered. Gandhi could use civil disobedience against the British because they wouldn’t kill him. Stalin never made that mistake.

Some shall say that I am exaggerating or that I am being shrill. I am not; I am coldly realistic about this. Orwell once wrote, “If you want a vision of the future, imagine a boot stamping on a human face – forever.” That is where this is headed. We shall be compelled to do all that ObamaCare demands. Then we shall be compelled to do all that the administrators say that ObamaCare demands.

Then we shall be compelled to do all that the administrators can get away with saying that ObamaCare demands.

stevewhitemd — I said “The American People will always choose a future of prosperity, better national security, more jobs and a return to Constitutional principles.”

And let me add, The American people will choose Free Market solutions, prosperity, freedom, safety, a better economy, more opportunity….WHEN THEY ARE OFFERED.

Republicans lost 2006, 2008, 1976, 1992, 1996. Listen to Newt in “2012: VICTORY OR DEATH” describe WHY we lost: e.g., 2006 and 2008 were performance elections … not values elections … We were fired because we didn’t perform … 2004 was a lost opportunity election…

When we run an incoherent “moderate” or “it’s his turn,” or — priceless — Candidate “Etch-A-Sketch,” WE LOSE. And we deserve to lose.

Everyone is RIGHTLY concerned about government overreach. But if, through our duly-elected representatives of the People, we REBALANCE the balance of power among the CO-EQUAL branches of the federal government, much of the overreaching we’re threatened by, as discussed above in the thread, will disappear. We will make the government responsive to the will of the people. Government our servant, not our master.

And then we won’t have fight from the relatively weak and risky position of defiant civil disobedience against the increasingly tyrannical State; because we, the American People, will be doing it lawfully, as our sovereign right to self government.

As part of this process, we will return power to the people and the states under the10th Amendment. The 10th Amendment project is headed up by Rick Perry. Their recommendations will be ready this summer.

stevewhitemd, of course you are exactly right. This is all about power over every aspect of our lives. Utopian tyranny. Of course, people through the ages have been forced into civil disobedience to fight back.

There is another card in our hand, however. There is an answer in the primary going on right now that can trump all the machinations of the wannabe tyrants: unleashing the American People.

If we nominate Newt, Newt will win in the fall. And Newt will sign legislation ON THE FIRST DAY completely repealing Obamacare.

The MSM want you to believe it can’t work. Newt is a mortal threat to them.

The hard part is NOW — getting past the Republican Establishment, the fellow traveler weenies, who, if they stood up to the Left, would be protecting us right now! THEY are AT LEAST as big a problem as the avowed Left. They’re doing everything they can to try to stop Newt.

Because if Newt is the nominee, Newt will win in the fall. And Newt will break up the Establishment. WE, WE THE PEOPLE will do it. Newt will help focus the energy.

Newt will run a team campaign. This has worked before. Newt describes how in the speech below.

In 1994, nine million NEW voters put the Republicans in the majority in the House and Senate. The NIGHT BEFORE THE ELECTION some were STILL saying it was impossible.

We can’t wait until the MSM start reporting that Newt might win. We have to look past them. They’re trying to peddle bad Kool-Aid.

A positive campaign based on free market solutions creates a better future and INCREASES the number of voters. Not just voter turnout; it actually brings out NEW voters.

The American People will always choose a future of prosperity, better national security, more jobs and a return to Constitutional principles.

Newt can be the nominee. If Newt is the nominee, Newt will win in the fall.

And then the real work will begin. Those of us who SEE WHAT YOU SEE, stevewhitemd, will restore the Constitution. We can do this.

The speech linked below is illuminating, energizing and inspiring. From 2009, a blueprint of what we’re doing and how we’re going to do it. This speech alone can show you what we’re doing and how it will work. “2012: VICTORY OR DEATH.”

[…] Corpse Of Trayvon Martin Abused By Barack Obama To Hide From Heathcare Scam Anniversary Today is the second year anniversary of the horrid and hated Obama heath scam passage into law. Did Barack Obama celebrate and trumpet his singular “achievement”? No. Barack Obama […]

This is worse than waking up after a night drinking and having sex with a prostitute, only to find that your wallet with all of its contents is missing and the prostitute has given you a venereal disease that can’t be cured.